I’ve wanted to write this post for a while now and when I read the news about the TV chef and cookbook author Paula Deen today announcing that she has type 2 diabetes and became the spokesperson for Novo Nordisk, I said: enough is enough!
Apparently, Paula Deen has had diabetes for 3 years now, but she didn’t make it public until now. Considering that the recipes of her TV show are full of high fat and calorie foods, one might think, she should have said something before and maybe started reeducating her audience with better and healthier food choices, instead of continuing being part of the problem by encouraging people to cook such hyper-caloric meals.
As many doctors and scientists affirm, diet is one of the leading causes of diabetes (clic that link to know other 21 possible causes of diabetes), so being diabetic and keeping cooking that way on her TV show may have been a bit contradictory or unethical. The worst of all, as she said live on TV, is that she’s not going to change the way she cooks on her shows.
Her show and popularity would be a great opportunity for her to help many people make better food choices. However, she seems to ignore that possibility or maybe she has already been brainwashed by big pharmaceutical companies. By the way, as spokesperson of Novo Nordisk (a pharmaceutical company that makes a non-insulin injectable diabetes drug) she is getting paid probably millions to spread the word about this medication, so no wonder that her “sponsors” want to keep the diabetic-making machine at top speed.
Why is it that as soon as celebrities announce that they have diabetes they are already spokesperson for some pharmaceutical company? Of course, for those companies, having a popular person, respected and followed by millions, making propaganda for their products helps hiding the possible negative effects of those drugs and make them seem normal, useful, necessary and good. The return on investment of these companies is humongous, even after having paid millions to these celebrities!
What other cases of celebrities as spokesperson for pharmaceutical companies do we have? Well, an important recent one, especially for young people, is the popular music sensation Nick Jonas who teamed up with Bayer and now sells glucometers through a website (it’s not that I don’t find those glucometers useful, it’s the implications behind celebrities helping keep the number of diabetics around the world as high as it is).
Another case was the well-known actress Halle Berry, who after being in a coma for a week she was told that she had type 1 diabetes. Novo Nordisk convinced her as well to be spokesperson for the pharmaceutical company. Although this case is somehow different, since Halle took full action and was able to manage diabetes without insulin or other drugs by changing diet, doing exercise, yoga… After having announced her healing, the whole health community and media went on to say that she must have been missdiagnosed because type 1 diabetes was “incurable”. WTH?!
It’s amazing how doctors lack curiosity nowadays (and I can confirm this everytime I visit my doctor for my regular diabetic checks). Most of them studied medicine to be able to understand how the body works and to find cures for diseases and help as many people as possible. Then, some time after graduation most of them just sit there and prescribe drugs instead of being curious and trying to find what could be causing this or that symptom (they are forced in this direction by our health system that works the way it works) and why someone could be cured of diabetes and others don’t.
Back to my initial question:
why shouldn’t celebrities be spokesperson for pharmaceutical companies.
Let me explain this with a similar example:
Let’s assume pollution caused by car gases indirectly makes people very sick (lung cancer for instance). Since the whole auto industry is based on oil-driven cars, because that’s the standard and what big oil companies want us to buy, we hardly have any other option but buy and drive this kind of cars.
Some day a celebrity is diagnosed with lung cancer and a multinational oil company reaches that celebrity and pays him/her millions to be their spokesperson for their “environmental efforts” like cutting down the use of paper at headquarters and those kind of campaigns.
Since the automobile industry’s main goal is to sell as many conventional cars as they can there is only one way they can stop being part of the problem and start being part of the solution: to stop producing cars that use oil and start making cars run by renewable clean energies, for instance.
In this case, the celebrity would be “greening” that industry’s or company’s polluting actions by making people pay attention to something else.
For me, the case about diabetes, celebrities and pharmaceutical companies is more or less the same.
Since the main goal of those companies is to make as much money as possible by selling loads of drugs, lancets, needles, glucometers… they need a continuous and growing number of patients to sell those products to. There is IN NO WAY a pharmaceutical company (or profit-driven association or foundation) that can seriously and sincerely do efforts to stop or cure diabetes, be it type 1 or type 2. Period! It goes against the natural laws of economy.
According to a research report coducted recently by the Juvenile Diabetes Cure Alliance from the over 330 diabetes type 1 human clinical trials that are underway right now, only 18% can be considered to aim for a cure to diabetes (according to the JDCA requirements).
That means, that the majority of the donations and foundations are funding research that is not even looking for a cure. Now, do you understand why big pharmaceutical companies “buy” those celebrities? So that money goes to the wrong foundations, researchers and purposes (and this applies to some of the main diabetes associations and foundations as well).
Why are those celebrities not becoming spokesperson for research laboratories that are actually getting close to find a cure (or already did it but lack the funds to take it forward) like Dr. Faustman’s project www.faustmanlab.org?
I’m fed up reading news about researchers that, during their clinical trials with humans, achieved a total cut-back of insulin for the majority of their patients for a period of 3 to 4 years, and then had to stop investigation due to the lack of funds.
And, as Sharon Ornsby, a member of the FBI financial crimes unit said, “pharmaceutical fraud is one of our top three threats” So, again, why shouldn’t any prominent person or celebrity promote and be spokesperson of pharmaceutical companies? For me is more than evident.
I think, if those celebrities funded and spread the word about research investigations addressing a cure for diabetes, we could find a cure for type 1 diabetes earlier than we think. For type 2 diabetes they could educate people about healthier food choices and encourage them to exercise regularly instead of encouraging them to take this or that drug.
As some personal development gurus say, we are only 5 people away from anyone in the world (through connections, family and friends). Could anyone please, reach out to those celebs and convince them that they could do much better and REALLY help the world?
Sigue leyendo Why shouldn’t celebrities be spokesperson for pharmaceutical companies?
It seems to me that most people are totally unaware of diabetes facts. It is shocking how many people actually suffer from diabetes in the world today. The prevalence of diabetes is increasing rapidly especially in developing countries like China and India. The WHO (World Health Organization) attributes this partly to increased obesity, changes in traditional eating habits and a more sedentary lifestyle (you can also read my post “The 21+1 Causes of Diabetes“). If diabetes statistics continue at their present levels of acceleration, the WHO predict diabetes will be the 7th leading cause of death in the entire world within 20 years.
Here are 9 diabetes facts you should keep in mind:
Diabetes Fact #1: In 2010, there were an estimated 346 Million people suffering from diabetes worldwide according to the WHO. Of these, 25.8 million live in the USA. The USA ranks number 3 in the world for countries with the highest prevalence of diabetes. There were over 2 million new cases of diabetes confirmed in the USA in 2010. Of these, nearly a quarter of a million were children and young people under the age of 20 years.
Diabetes Fact #2: Prevalence by type: There are two major types of diabetes.
- Insulin dependent or Type 1 diabetes is caused by insufficient amounts of insulin being produced. Officially, there is no preventative measure for Type 1 diabetes. Type 1 diabetes usually becomes evident in childhood or in young adulthood. It is the most severe type of diabetes.
- In the non-insulin dependant diabetes or Type 2 Diabetes, the body produces insulin, but uses it ineffectively. The non-insulin dependant group is by far the largest group. Approximately 90% of all diabetes sufferers are Type 2 diabetics. Type 2 diabetes occurred traditionally in older people, but the worrying fact now is that younger people and even children are suffering from Type 2 diabetes. The consens now is that Type 2 diabetes occurs predominantly in people with incorrect eating habits, obesity and those who lack exercise.
- A third type of Diabetes is the gestational diabetes. In these cases, blood sugar levels are raised during pregnancy. The blood sugar levels usually revert to normal after the baby is born. Gestational diabetes could be a precursor for developing Type 2 diabetes.
Diabetes Fact #3: There are many millions of diabetics who have never been diagnosed. In USA the figure is estimated at 7 million. In poorer countries, specially if they copy the more industrialized lifestyle, where there are often no facilities for diagnosis or treatment, the numbers could be much higher.
Diabetes Fact #4: Ethnicity does play a role in your chances of suffering from diabetes. In USA the Hispanic Puerto Rican group have the highest prevalence at 13.8% and the non-Hispanic white group the lowest at 7%.
Diabetes Fact #5: Diabetes has many health consequences, especially when blood sugar levels are not kept under control. Diabetic sufferers are very prone to develop the following illnesses if not controlled:
- Heart disease causes more than 50% of premature deaths in diabetic sufferers (WHO)
- High blood pressure is extremely common in overweight Type 2 diabetics.
- Dental and oral problems and fungal infections occur frequently.
- Raised blood sugar levels affect the eyes and might cause blindness.
- Goat and problems with kidney.
- …and the list can go on and on…
Diabetes Fact #6: Diabetes is the number one cause of kidney disease and kidney failure. Almost half of the cases of kidney failure are diabetics. Many of these can end up needing dialysis if sugar is not controlled. Life quality and span are adversely affected.
Diabetes Fact #7: Diabetes causes damage to the nervous system. More than half of all amputations are as a result of diabetes. More than half of all diabetic patients suffer from neuropathy in some form, usually in the limbs. Some of the common symptoms experienced are, pain, numbness, lack of strength or ‘pins and needles’.
Diabetes Fact #8: Treating and living with diabetes, is very costly, both to yourself in terms of lost work, medical expenses and much more, but also to the State in the form of health care and Disability Grants. People suffering from diabetes cost the Government more than twice as much as people without diabetes.
Diabetes Fact #9: Large numbers of diabetes sufferers and complications could have been prevented very simply by:
- maintaining a healthy body weight
- eating a healthy diet with fresh fruit and vegetables and avoiding highly refined, fatty, fried and processed foods, sodas…
- following a regular exercise program
- avoiding tobacco and high alcohol consumption
- early diagnosis (if you then do the things mentioned above)
I think it is good thing to be aware of diabetes facts. Although they can be depressing at first sight, they can also be the motivation to do something different to what we have always done in terms of health.
It is just as important to make up your mind you are not going to be part of these diabetes statistics while you are healthy. Prevention is far better (and cheaper) than cure.
Diabetes facts should act both as a warning and as a motivation for a healthier lifestyle.
Photo: IDF Diabetes Atlas
We are again at this time of year, when everyone seems a bit more aware about diabetes and there are plenty good intentions.
The truth is that many people are honestly and sincerely devoting their time and motivation to make life more bearable for those with diabetes.
I take my hat off to those people. To whom I don’t take my hat off is to the companies or organizations that are apparently promoting (with words and advertising campaigns) the cure of diabetes, but in reality make it impossible for a cure to go public. That strikes me as the worst hypocrisy.
But anyway, I didn’t want to talk about that, but what awaits me in this next “diabetic year”.
It’s funny that just today, the World Diabetes Day I got in touch with a German doctor who claims to have patented a treatment to cure type 1 diabetes.
I have not read much about it yet, but I read the information on his website about the experiments made which resulted in 8 out of 10 people with type 1 diabetes definitively stopped needing insulin after 9 -12 months of treatment.
In this case, this isn’t a treatment with alternative medicines, like the majority of diabetes treatments mentioned on this website, but it’s an allopathic physician using a mixture of 3 medicines that ensures that the individual’s own cells stop attacking his own pancreatic cells, giving the body a chance to rebuild their beta cells if they had ceased to produce them or to continue producing them in case it was still producing beta cells.
I will research more on this, but Prof. Dr. von Arnim, the discoverer of such treatment has told me through his website that he’s doing the necessary to open his praxis in Germany and begin treating patients with his method in 3 to 6 months.
Of course, there are already people trying to discredit him, as in all cases where a doctor or scientist claims that he has discovered the cure for a chronic disease.
But there are other doctors and scientists who are supporting and recognizing his work.
I will tell you more as soon as I get more details.
As you can see, it was the most appropiate day to receive this news and start this year with a lot of motivation!
How is your year 2011-2012 with diabetes going to be? ¿Optimistic or pessimistic? Do you have something to fight for or you prefer to settle with what you have? Let me know with a comment below.
Recently I read a news that I thought had to share with you all, especially the ones with diabetes type 1.
Scientists in Israel are testing a new drug that can avoid the need for insulin injections.
“It has been developed to block the process which causes the body’s immune system to attack the pancreas.”
Since it stops the attacks to the pancreas, if your pancreas is still producing its own insulin, you could have a good chance to live without insulin shots. Therefore, this drugs seems to be aimed to newly diagnosed type 1 diabetics who still produce insulin.
Trials are taking place at centres in Europe, North America, South Africa and Israel and they expect it to be available in 3 years.
Let’s see if this is not another treatment to give us hope but is never available to the public. And if it doesn’t have side effects.
If you want to read the full news, click here.
Throughout the 13 years that I have lived with Type 1 Diabetes, I read a lot about the subject, visited different types of physicians, and tried different diets and alternative treatments.
My research and experience made it clear to me that there are many possible causes for diabetes and, therefore, there are many types of therapies or treatments for it.
I am providing a list of all possible causes (of either Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes) that I’ve heard of or read about. Many of them will not be “officially” recognized as causes of diabetes, but if you know me you also know that “official” matters little to me! Since no one seems to know the exact causes, the list is more of a collection of hypotheses of possible causes.
Many doctors and websites say that the main cause of diabetes is the body’s inability to produce insulin or even insulin resistance. In my opinion, these are symptoms, not actual causes.
21 Possible Causes of Diabetes
1. Hereditary: this is one of the main hypotheses for causes of diabetes, which appears to have a consensus among allopathic doctors, naturalists, and scientists. In some countries diabetes may be more prevalent than in others, since several members of one family might have the disease.
The thing about having a hereditary disease is that you don’t know for sure if it will develop; it depends on other factors that trigger the gene that activates diabetes. There are cases of twins, one of them developed diabetes and the other did not. Therefore, if you have a family member who has or had diabetes, you should take care of proper nutrition, exercise, and avoiding stress (or developing good coping mechanisms!) to ensure the lowest chance of developing diabetes.
2. Lifestyle: this is another one of the most acknowledged causes of diabetes. This term refers to the type of life one leads. That is to say the food you eat (your diet), whether or not you exercise, if one has other habits that impact one’s health such as obesity, poor sleep, smoking, drinking alcohol and other habits.
While some say that the food itself (e.g., eating too many sweets) does not cause diabetes directly, they could cause it indirectly. By eating sweets or refined flours one is constantly bombarding one’s pancreas with simple sugars, which pass very quickly into the blood. As a result, the pancreas is constantly strained to keep glucose levels under control. In addition, too much glucose in the blood causes inflammation of internal tissues, which could contribute to causing diabetes or other associated diseases.
Obesity is also directly associated with diabetes. The epidemic levels of cases of diabetes in the world parallel to the increase of obese people. Indeed, it seems clear that today poor nutrition in industrialized societies, the lack of regular exercise, combined with high levels of stress in our daily lives, are causing 50% of humanity to be in worse health than they were 50 or even 100 years ago! Given all the scientific and educational advancements, statistics should be the other way around: people should be in better health.
3. Autoimmune processes: this is a cause mainly associated with Type 1 diabetes.
Insulin-producing cells in the pancreas of people with Type 1 diabetes are destroyed by cells that normally protect us from invading organisms. What triggers this is still not clear, but there is some evidence suggesting that a virus infection or cow’s milk can start the process of the body to attack its own cells.
There seems to be evidence that the pancreatic beta cells (responsible for the production of insulin) have significant inflammation, leading the immune system to create a type of antibody which is responsible for destroying these cells. Others say it’s some kind of virus that directly attacks the beta cells of the pancreas. Still others associate this process to emotional states, as an autoimmune disease is a metaphor for an “allergy to himself,” so continued long-term psychological or emotional issues could cause the problem of self-attack.
4. Environmental factors: in different countries there are different incidence rates of diabetes according to race, climate, diet, latitude, etc. Which makes one suspect that unidentified environmental factors act as predisposing to diabetes. (1)
5. Glucose intolerance: 1/4 of people with glucose intolerance developed diabetes. Some patients‘ intolerance actually experienced it to be reversed. Modifying your diet and adding exercise may slow -or even stop!- the process that leads to diabetes.
Glucose intolerance may last 7 to 10 years before the onset of Type 2 diabetes. The intolerance often goes undiagnosed, until it develops into full-blown diabetes.
6. Stress: there are scientific studies suggesting that depression, general emotional stress, and anxiety (along with sleep disturbances, anger/hostility) are associated with an increased risk for developing Type 2 diabetes.
Stress can cause diabetes because in that state the body produces the adrenaline and cortisol hormones, which result in increased blood sugar. Stress can also cause you to make wrong eating choices. Some scientists believe that stress is the cause of 95% of diseases.
7. Age: a clear fact is that diabetes, especially Type 2, is much more prevalent in adults from the age of forty. The older the age group, the higher the incidence of diabetes. A shocking 80% percent of diabetes cases occur after age 45! This could be because, as a person ages, they become less active and tend to gain weight, causing dysfunction of the pancreas.
8. Virus or illness: some research suggests that viral infections may trigger diabetes in genetically susceptible individuals.
Among the suspected viruses are enteric viruses that attack the intestinal tract. Coxsackie is an enteric virus of particular interest. Epidemics of the coxsackie virus (as well as mumps and congenital rubella) have been associated with the incidence of Type 1 diabetes.
In a scientific study, 73 pancreatic samples of young people who had died from diabetes were examined. The results found that 60% of the organs contained evidence of beta cell infections from entero viruses.
By contrast, researchers barely found any infected beta cells in tissue samples taken from 50 children without diabetes (2).
9. Vaccines: “Currently, vaccines are related to increased cases of allergy (rhinitis, conjunctivitis, asthma, …) and autoimmune diseases (diabetes mellitus or multiple sclerosis). This is because in the people receiving innoculations, the vaccines stimulate a reaction of the defense system (immune system), which then protects one from getting the diseases to which they were vaccinated. While vaccinations can cause allergic reactions and various types of diseases (such as autoimmune), the same alteration of the immune system, can instead cause the immune system to protect us against external aggressors such as bacteria and other kinds of germs. However, this change of the immune system can also result in attacks on our own body, either by producing an excessive response (allergy) or affecting specific organs (diabetes or multiple sclerosis).
It is assumed that vaccines could alter the functioning of the defense system, favoring the emergence of these diseases.”(3)
10. Accident or trauma: a chiropractor and an osteopath I visited a few years ago told me that my diabetes could have been caused by a car accident that I had a year before discovering my diabetes. This might come into play: the strong emotional stress of the moment, the emotional guilt later on, trauma, or blockage of any vertebrae in the backbone through which passes the energy/communication that connects with the pancreas.
11. Parasites in the pancreas: recently I found that research shows that many diabetics have a parasite known as Eurytrema (Eurytrema pancreaticum) or pancreatic fluke.
Through the repeated consumption of beef and derived products (especially when raw or semi raw), the pancreas is continually re-infected with the parasite. It has also been shown that the accumulation of wood alcohol (methanol) in the pancreas provides a good breeding ground for this parasite in the pancreas. Surprisingly, methanol is found in many popular foods, either through packaging or preparation, including water bottled in plastic, cans of soft drinks, artificial sweeteners and even baby formula. “By killing this parasite and removing wood alcohol from the diet, the need for insulin can be cut in half in three weeks (or sooner!).”(4)
12. Poor cellular communication: cellular communication is receiving a lot of attention from many scientific magazines in recent years. As I wrote in another article on glyconutrients and cellular communication, we can not be healthy without good cellular communication. Every cell in every body’s systems needs to constantly communicate to do its job. If this communication is broken or blocked in some way, there will be some organ or tissue that won’t get the necessary nutrients to function properly, and the cell won’t know what is missing or needed.
13. Lack of vitamin D: for years naturopaths have warned about the impact of Vitamin D deficiency. Finally, it seems that this issue is being taken more seriously. After observing more than 5,000 people over 5 years in an ongoing study conducted in Australia, researchers found that those with Vitamin D levels lower than the average, had a 57% higher risk of developing Type 2 diabetes than those people with levels in the recommended range.
Previous studies have shown that Vitamin D may also help to keep blood sugar levels under control, helping Vitamin D release more insulin.
Vitamin D has also been associated with reduced risk of asthma, heart disease, and certain forms of cancers.
The main source of Vitamin D is the sun. That is to say that when we’re in the sun we get charged with this vitamin. It is estimated that in some societies, like the United States, 90% of the population is Vitamin D deficient. Some studies are relating this deficiency to the Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes epidemic.
Researchers from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition reported in May 2004 that Vitamin D improves insulin sensitivity up to 60%! (5)
14. Pregnancy: As with other types of diabetes, the causes of gestational diabetes are unkown. Gestational diabetes may be due to insulin resistance by cells in the body, which is of equal amounts in non-diabetic pregnant women as when they are not pregnant, but in diabetics is found to be three times higher than when not pregnant. The placenta is responsible for providing nutrients and water to the growing fetus, and produces several hormones to maintain pregnancy, which in turn can have a blocking effect or act against insulin (6).
15. Medications: Certain drugs or medications (such as steroids and Dilantin) can raise the blood sugar through a variety of mechanisms. Other medications (such as alloxan, streptozocin, and thiazide diuretics) are toxic to pancreatic beta cells and, thus, may cause diabetes. Clozapine (Clozaril), olanzapine (Zyprexa), risperidone (Risperdal), quetiapine (Seroquel) and ziprasidone (Geodon) are known to induce this lethal disease. (7).
16. Toxins: the results of a research study (“Toxins and Diabetes Mellitus: An Environmental Connection?”) suggests that two environmental toxins, arsenic and dioxin (dibenzo-p-dioxins), may have some association with increased risk of diabetes. It should be noted that the results only indicate a possible link between diabetes and environmental toxins (8).
It is also known that long-term exposure to pesticides may increase the risk of Type 1 diabetes, lupus, and other autoimmune diseases (9).
17. Alcohol: alcohol use disrupts the pancreas and can cause pancreatitis, diabetes, peritonitis, and so on.
18. Infant exposure to cow’s milk: the protein in cow’s milk directly harms the pancreas of some babies by causing a complicated autoimmune reaction where the baby’s own immune system attacks the pancreas. The result will almost always be Type 1 diabetes mellitus. Several clinical studies indicate that children with Type 1 diabetes drank cow’s milk at a younger age than other children without diabetes. (10)
19. Pancreatitis: “Pancreatitis is the inflammation of the pancreas. It occurs when the enzymes that digest food are activated in the pancreas instead of the small intestine. Pancreatitis may be acute or chronic. Acute pancreatitis is very sudden and lasts for a few days while chronic pancreatitis occurs over many years. Chronic pancreatitis has multiple causes and painful symptoms.”(Wikipedia)
20. Hypothyroidism: Hypothyroidism is a condition that affects the thyroid gland. While this causes many complications in itself, hypothyroidism can lead to other health problems, one of them being diabetes. Hypothyroidism is a condition where the thyroid gland does not produce enough hormones to stimulate the metabolism, causing all the body systems to slow down.
When a disease such as hypothyroidism is involved, the pancreas decreases its ability to convert blood sugar into energy. This complication can lead to diabetes.
21. Polycystic ovary syndrome: Polycystic ovary syndrome is a disorder that affects up to 10% of women in the age of fertility.
Common symptoms include infertility, menstrual irregularities, obesity, excess facial and body hair. Up to 10% of women with POS develop Type 2 diabetes at 40 years and more than half of women with POS will develop both Type 2 diabetes or prediabetes at that age. (11)
22. Gluten intolerance (Celiac disease): between 5 and 10% of people with type 1 diabetes also have gluten intolerance, although many do not know. In fact gluten intolerance may be what is causing their diabetes, especially in young children and if you act fast and find to have celiac disease, go to a gluten-free diet as soon as possible. It could stop and even reverse the process of diabetes (or at least use less drugs, insulin …) Therefore, ask your doctor to take a test of gluten intolerance as soon as possible after having been diagnosed type 1 diabetes (it also works if a long time passed by, but the reversal of diabetes could be easier the sooner you know it and act on it), especially if there’s family history with diabetes or celiac disease.
As you can see, there are many possible causes of diabetes, some with more scientific rigor, others less, but even if there was only one person whose diabetes was caused by one of the hypotheses mentioned above, it is worth mentioning and studying. At the end of the day, not just large study groups have value; each of us is important and worth to consider the cause(s) or optional treatment(s) of the disease in each case.
Chances are that in most cases several factors combine to cause diabetes.
So, my questions to you are:
Did any of these causes speak directly to your gut?
What will you do with the information/statistics/data you just read?
Are you going to try to find the most likely cause of your diabetes?
Are you going to seek a remedy to that cause?
Please share your ideas below.
Sources:
(1)http://www.hormone.org/diabetes_symptoms.cfm
(2)http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/03/05/us-diabetes-viruses-idUSTRE5246GM20090305
(3)http://www.naturalnews.com/023902.html
(4)http://www.drclark.net/en/drclark_protocol/illnesses/diabetes.php
(5)http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/27/us-vitamind-diabetes-idUSTRE73Q6VH20110427
(6)http://www.babycenter.com/0_gestational-diabetes_2058.bc
(7)http://visionmissionfoundation.org/cause_of_diabetes.htm
(8)http://spectrum.diabetesjournals.org/content/15/2/109.full
(9)http://www.diabetesselfmanagement.com/Blog/Flashpoints/diabetes_the_toxin_connection/
(10)http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ajmg.10340/full
(11)http://www.health.com/health/condition-article/0,,20187970,00.html
This time I come with good news, especially for those with type 2 diabetes.
Two days ago newspapers and online news sites started publishing news referencing the discovery that British researchers have made in which diet can cure type 2 diabetes.
In my opinion, this shouldn’t really be news today, because there are several methods (in this blog you can read about some of them) who long claim that with proper diet and sport diabetes type 2 can be reversed. Anyway, all the hype that is being given to this news will be good too.
In a nutshell, they have discovered that taking a 600 calories diet for 2 months, type 2 diabetes disappears with the elimination of fat around the pancreas. This is also what they are doing in some hospitals to remove obesity (and diabetes) in obese people. Of course, such a treatment costs about $20,000. With the diet, however, the cost is reduced to almost zero.
They say they will have to continue doing experiments to see if the cure of diabetes is permanent or only temporary, and apply it to many more patients.
The question I bear in mind is if such a diet is only applicable to obese people or it may be used by non obese or thin individuals with type 2 diabetes. I would also like to know what kind of supplements have been used to energize the body, since I find 600 calories very little to the average person.
For a long time I’ve been an advocate of using a proper diet and sport (ie a change in lifestyle) to treat type 2 diabetes.
If you want to cure your type 2 diabetes but 600 calories seem too little for you, I recommend the book “The 30 Day Cure Diabetes” by Dr. Ripich, which reveals how to eliminate diabetes (especially type 2) in 30 days, step by step.
In this link I reviewed Dr. Ripich’s book and why I love it so much.
Here the news source.
Go find your way to cure your type 2 diabetes!
A new case of successful stem cell therapy to cure diabetes type 1 and type 2. This time in China, carried out with people, not animals. Are we closer to find a cure for everyone? What do we, patients with diabetes, relatives and friends worldwide must do to make pharmaceutical companies and governments to take our lives seriously and to let us heal?
Cellonis Diabetes Stem Cell Therapy: A Chance for Insulin Independence and the Reversal of Complications
The second link is a video of a doctor who worked many years for Eli Lilly & Co., one of the largest manufacturers of insulin and pills for people with diabetes, in which he speaks of how dirty and corrupt the health-system is, and how naive and gullible we are all to obey doctors/pharmacists without questioning.
Videos of Dr. John Virapen about corruption in the pharmaceutical industry, governments and doctors:
Video 1
Video 2
Video 3
It seems that good news are spreading lately, or at least hopeful news, for those who have diabetes.
I am posting a link to a story about an experiment in mice that cured 50% of the critters with a single injection, which caused his immune system to cease the attack on its own pancreatic cells.
With so many successful experiments of type 1 diabetes cure, I can’t believe that there is no treatment available on the market yet.
Sciencedaily.com: Success in reversing type 1 diabetes in mice
And another link to a video on an insulin pump to make daily life easier to those who want to carry it. Worth seeing and thinking about using one: Living without injections
Are you using an insulin pump? How does that affect your life?: Please, share it with a comment.
Here we are again, November 14th, World Diabetes Day.
Seems like yesterday when I wrote an article for this day last year. Another year has passed by and I don’t see any changes on the horizon for those who have diabetes. Instead of getting better every year, things are getting worse at times, with alarms of global epidemics of diabetes and obesity.
And I wonder, what is being done to improve the situation, not just “trying to control” it but to cure diabetes permanently? What is being done with the money devoted to research in this field?
With this background, I intend to write my “Letter to Santa Claus” on World Diabetes Day to ask for what I want. (After all, things shouldn’t be so difficult. Aren’t the government, ministries of health, health centers, doctors… supposed to work for us, for our well-being, for our health? Like a father does everything in his power for his son, so the son has all he needs to grow up healthy and happy.)
Well, if we put them in power, we should require them to do the things we need.
My personal letter, rather than asking for the obvious, that is, making all efforts to find a cure for diabetes, would focus more on asking for things like:
- Why did they change from animal insulin to human insulin in most cases without asking permission, and even worse, without explaining the pros and cons of both? Human insulin (which almost everyone is using), for example, can produce significant hypoglycemia without clear symptoms of hypoglycemia, so it can be dangerous. Why don’t they tell us about that?
- Why do we have to go every other week to the health center to get the items we need (needles, strips…)? We have lives to live and do not want to waste it on health centers.
- Why don’t we have a choice about the type of therapy that we want in our own cases of diabetes? Furthermore, the only treatment that we are given by the public health system is one that doesn’t contribute a bit to the healing process; rather our condition worsens with the recommended diet. Did not we pay our taxes? Aren’t there any other options for successful treatments in the improvement and cure diabetes? Yes, there are, yet they are so expensive that only a few can benefit from them.
- Why in health centers don’t our doctors give us information about foods and plants that help lower blood sugar levels naturally, and why, when they recommend something, is it always drugs?
- Why aren’t they spending more money on stem cell research that has been so successful (patients after self transplantation of adult stem cells could be up 3 to 4 years without insulin)? Why does a transplant of this kind cost around $15,000, not being covered by insurance, but the public health system spends more than that in keeping us sick?
- And something that I would ask to those who suffer from diabetes, how long will we let them do with us and our health as they like? When will we rise up together to demand what we deserve?
Anyways, I hope that prevention and education campaigns about diabetes that will start with the World Diabetes Day 2009 are successful in preventing more cases of diabetes.
Feel free to write in the comments section, how can we stop them playing with us and our health.
Update June 2011: my guess is that if more and more people follow the recommendations and easy steps from Dr. Ripich to cure diabetes in 30 days (especially diabetes type 2), many people could be really celebrating World Diabetes Day soon, from the “already cured” perspective.
Sigue leyendo World Diabetes Day 2009 with letter to Santa Claus
Stem cell transplant as a possible cure for type 1 diabetes has been under investigation for a few years. I try to follow the evolution of these treatments closely, and just today I read a story that made my day.
A study by scientists from the universities of Chicago and Brazil has shown that auto-transplant of stem cells freed 20 of the 23 patients enrolled in the study from having to inject insulin.
These scientists showed that stem cell transplants from the bone marrow of the patient (auto-transplant) can help to keep blood sugar levels controlled for years in people with type 1 diabetes without using insulin (according to an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association).
The study was carried out in Brazil from 2004 to 2008, involving 23 people with type 1 diabetes, aged between 13 and 31 years old. 20 participants are still without insulin or immunosuppressive treatments or any other type of medication.
The study consisted of extracting stem cells from the patient’s blood and then freezing them. Then the participants were medicated to decrease the incorrect responses of their immune systems (which attacks its own pancreatic cells). Later they were injected with stem cells. Best of all is that they were not embryonic stem cells, but adult stem cells from the patient themselves.
Although the study was small in size, the results are very encouraging for a possible scientific cure or for more effective treatments of people with type 1 diabetes.
The pros in my opinion were that this was achieved with adult stem cells from the patient, and the 87 percent resounding success rate of the study.
The con may be that slowing down or stopping the immunosuppressive activity leaves the body defenseless against other diseases. I don’t know how far they removed or just slowed down the immune activity, but in any case, great news for everyone.
Here a video about it:
Sigue leyendo New Developments in Stem Cell Self Transplant: Hope for people with Type 1 Diabetes
Hi, everyone. Due to other personal projects I have been neglecting this blog a little.
I will take today, World Health Day, to write a few lines.
Just today I read some news that comes in handy to reflect on the current status of the health care system.
The news can be summarized as follows:
“The costs of care for this disease (diabetes), should appropriate interventions not be established, could bankrupt the health system of the country in the next decade.”
The article refers to Mexico, but I think it is a situation that is affecting most countries and cities around the world, especially the “developed” world. It seems unbelievable, but the more money governments spend on treating some disease, the more cases of the disease (like diabetes) appear. According to the news I read, “In the last three years about 17 billion pesos have been invested in the construction and equipping of 800 medical units of different sizes.”
The relationship should be inverted, don’t you think? The more you spend on treating disease, the fewer cases of the disease. But not so.
In my humble opinion, the problem is that they are spending all that money just to “treat” diseases, not to prevent them or cure them. Treating a disease means that you develop a system to keep the disease at the same point, i.e. neither improving or worsening. And this is how the pharmaceutical industry makes billions of dollars, Euros or whatever currency you choose: by maintaining the disease.
Things would be different if the patients themselves were the people who decide where to spend public money (the money we are all paying).
But hey, they say there’s an ill wind that blows no good, so probably we “need” a total breakdown of the healthcare system in order to get a change in the way we treat our citizens’ illnesses.
I leave you with what UNICEF says about this topic:
“Health is a state of complete physical and mental well being. Health is not only absence of disease, but an appropriate balance between the physical, mental, cultural and social conditions of humans. This means that sometimes, good health is beyond what medicine can achieve. The World Health Day was created to raise awareness of health issues and generate action to encourage greater and better access to healthcare worldwide. “
A few weeks ago I read an interesting story that was again hopeful for many diabetics who are waiting for a scientific cure for type 1 diabetes.
The journal Cell published a new Canadian study with animals, where mice were injected with capsaicin, the substance that makes chili peppers spicy, and they were quickly cured of type 1 diabetes.
Researchers from the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto believe that Type 1 diabetes — the most serious form of the disease that usually appears in childhood — is caused by malfunctioning pain nerves that surround cells in the pancreas.
In patients suffering from Type 1 diabetes, the pancreas fails to produce sufficient levels of insulin, causing inflammation and death of insulin-producing islet cells in the pancreas. Experts have long believed that the condition was caused by the body’s immune system turning against itself, but the Toronto researchers — immunologist Dr. Hans Michael Dosch and pain expert Dr. Michael Salter — theorized faulty pancreatic pain neurons could be to blame.
Dosch had observed in previous research that islet cells in diabetics were surrounded by an “enormous” number of pain nerves that signaled the brain that the pancreatic tissue was damaged.
To test their theory, Dosch and Salter injected capsaicin into mice that had Type 1 diabetes, to kill the animals’ pancreatic pain nerves. The researchers said they were stunned to discover that the injected mice’s islet cells began producing insulin normally almost immediately.
”I couldn’t believe it,” Salter said. “Mice with diabetes suddenly didn’t have diabetes anymore.”
Dosch and Salter discovered on further research that the pancreatic nerve cells were a vital part of the functioning of islet cells, by secreting neuropeptides that tell the islets to release insulin. The nerves weren’t secreting enough neuropeptides, causing a “vicious cycle” of stress on the islets.
The researchers then injected the neuropeptide — dubbed “substance P” — into the pancreases of the diabetic mice. The mice’s islet inflammation rapidly cleared up, and the animals’ diabetes disappeared. According to Dosch and Salter, some mice have remained “cured” for up to four months with a single injection.
The researchers also found that their capsaicin/”substance P” treatments helped curb the insulin resistance that causes Type 2 diabetes.
According to consumer health advocate Mike Adams, author of “How to Halt Diabetes in 25 Days,” Dosch and Salter’s study proves that Type 1 diabetes — like Type 2 diabetes — is “a disease of cellular miscommunication.
It also shows that diabetes can, indeed, be cured, and that’s a fact that the conventional medical community simply does not want to acknowledge, Adams said. Treating diabetes is far too lucrative. Embracing a cure would devastate the drug companies and health care businesses that depend on a diabetes epidemic.
Dosch and Salter expect to complete human trials of the treatment in the next year.
Original story
Interesting, don’t you think? Let’s see how far these investigations go and how many years do we have to wait until this reasearch is applied to humans.
Tomorrow, November 14, 2008, we will “celebrate” World Diabetes Day. For another year the opportunity has come to announce with fanfare that it’s a special day, dedicated to diabetes.
I wrote “celebrate” in quotes because I do not think it is an occasion to celebrate. It is a very sad thing that there are more and more people with diabetes, and especially that the number of cases of children with diabetes is dramatically increasing. For me, personally, and with all due respect to those who strive to change things, this seems like a failure on the parts of our health system and government. Why else, since we have a technology thousands of times more advanced than 50 years ago, would the number of people suffering from diabetes increase exponentially? Isn’t it supposed to be the opposite: improving technology and science = improving health? Apparently not. In this case the technology and science improve while people’s health worsens.
And I wonder, how can this be happening? The obvious answer that comes to my mind is that perhaps we are on the wrong path. We are trying to control (which isn’t the same as curing) symptoms that are just a reflex, the body’s reaction to a cause, which can vary from one person to another.
I guess that we will keep “celebrating” World Diabetes Day for many years, until there is a change of mentality, so that scientific, medical, and political attention is directed to removing and curing the real cause of the symptoms that we perceive as thirst, the constant urge to urinate, weight loss, lack of energy… that we call diabetes.
Of course, if we want to get to a cure for diabetes we will have to change things from below, us people, because it seems that the high spheres are not willing to sacrifice power and economic benefits for the health of the people who they are supposed to represent.
Many times a combination of small changes is what eventually makes a big difference. For example, the other day I read that eating beans is essential to reduce the occurrence of diabetes mellitus and cancer because beans are one of the foods that raise blood glucose levels least. It has been found that consumption of beans on a regular basis helps to control the level of fats and glucose in the blood, and helps control the metabolism in general, therefore preventing diabetes and cancer, two of the leading causes of death in many countries (Mexico is on the top of the list).
I find it no less than intriguing that in the last 10 years the tradition of generations that made beans a basic food in Mexico has begun to fade. And coincidentally (or not so coincidentally) in recent years the number of diabetics in Mexico has increased, until diabetes has become one of the leading causes of death there.
Aren’t these two circumstances related? Aren’t these little changes in our eating habits and lifestyle consuming our bodies little by little? We are eating less and less healthy food; our foods are refined, canned or ready to heat and serve. We exercise less, sitting longer and longer in front of a television, computer, video console, or just being a couch potato. We receive less vitamin D from the sun, and when exposed to the sun we do it so that we get sunburned or full covered with some kind of super-protector sunscreen.
Let’s start here, by making small changes in those lifestyle habits, and see how our bodies show gratitude by doing what they were created to do: heal themselves.
Of course, those of us who have already spent years with these symptoms (which many call diabetes) may need extra help, but the goal is the same: healing, not just controlling the disease.
As you have found, I do not want to talk about the number of monuments and historic buildings around the world that will be lit in blue lights tomorrow in commemoration of World Diabetes Day, or about the planned activities, because I assume that that is what 99% of tomorrow’s articles will talk about.
You already know me, I like to swim against the current sometimes. Do not hesitate to leave your comments on what this day means to you, what has been done in your community, or anything you are interested in sharing with others.
By following this link you can see one of the videos that has been prepared for this day by international organizations. The sad part of it, I think, is the kid’s comment about diabetes being part of his life and not being able to do anything about it. To tell a child that there is nothing he can do to change his situation or circumstances is like taking the wings off a bird. Who knows, maybe that child could find a cure for this disease if we let his imagination and his creativity remain intact, and if we could teach him to believe that anything IS POSSIBLE.
Update June 2011: my guess is that if more and more people follow the recommendations and easy steps from Dr. Ripich to cure diabetes (especially diabetes type 2), many people could be really celebrating World Diabetes Day soon, from the “already cured” perspective.
Today I read an interesting story:
An experimental drug for diabetes dispenses insulin in response to glucose levels.
SmartCells biotechnology company in the U.S. is developing a drug that could do most of the work in the control of diabetes.
The injectable drug, called SmartInsulin, detects elevated glucose levels and automatically dispenses insulin as needed. As glucose levels fall, the medicine is stabilized, retaining the insulin until the next sugar rush.
A drug like this could reduce the number of required insulin injections per day.
Todd Zion, SmartCells founder and president, says that a drug that is self-regulated like this can also reduce the risk of hypoglycemia, a potential danger associated with current therapies for diabetes.
The company has tested the drug on hundreds of rodents and has recently been experimenting with pigs that do not produce enough insulin – models that are more similar to human diabetes.
So far, Zion’s team found that the drug is able to detect and adapt to fluctuating glucose levels and provide insulin as needed, maintaining stable levels while avoiding an overdose of insulin that could lead to hypoglycemia.
Zion intends to begin clinical trials within the next two years. Last week, SmartCells received $1,000,000 to fund studies on the safety and efficacy of the drug in preclinical trials with animals, as part of a collaboration with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
You can read the full story here: Smart Insulin
It seems that finally we can buy and take stevia as it is: a natural sweetener with beneficial properties, not something labeled as a dietary supplement or an additive for the bath (which was required by producers or distributors of stevia so far, since authorities did not allow it to be sold as a sweetener).
I just read a story in an spanish online newspaper entitled “The ka’a he’ê is a drug that can fight diabetes and hypertension,” which in fact is an interview with medical researcher Dr. Luis A. Barriocanal Perasso.
To date, stevia or ka’a he’ê (its original name) was only allowed for sale as a sweetener in a few countries, while in others like the U.S. and Europe could only be sold as a dietary supplement (many believe that this was due to multinational companies’ that produce artificial sweeteners, who feared for their business). Some institutions allowed using it in moderation because they were not sure of stevia’s long-term effects.
Now the JECFA (its acronym in English, the Joined Experts Committee on Food Additives) of the USFO and WHO (United States Food Organization and the World Health Organization, respectively), which are global entities that regulate substances to make sure they are safe for human consumption, have approved stevia for consumption in the world.
All is left is for the U.S. FDA and the European EFSA to comply with the administrative formalities required and remove those barriers that were raised against stevia. Understanding how these institutions work, I would not be surprised if some time still needs to go by to do the paperwork necessary for change.
I recommend reading the interview (that is, if you can read spanish), which talks about:
• Findings after the first global long-term study on stevia.
• Use of stevia to replace other oral hypoglycemic agents, i.e. other tablets to treat diabetes, but naturally.
• Pressures and conspiracy against stevia.
• Safety of this herb for human use.
• Benefits of stevia for your health: lowers blood sugar, and blood pressure when it is high.
• Future demand for stevia from food and beverage companies.
• Its use to prevent diabetes.
• Insufficient current production of stevia.
In short, we’re in luck, because this decision to declare stevia as totally safe for human consumption will benefit many people.
Have you already tried stevia? What effects have you experienced in your body using it?
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